Deeplinks Blog posts about Patents

Oh, how the times are changing. The last few weeks have brought significant encouraging news about the prospects for patent reform. Leaders in D.C., including the chairmen of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, along with the President, have all acknowledged the essential need for immediate reform.

1-800-CONTACTS contacted us, through their lawyer, to complain about this post. The company complains that we incorrectly stated that it does not provide a virtual try-on system. Well, it turns out that the company (which owns Glasses.com) intends to launch a virtual try-on iPad app. We weren't aware of this app. And this is not surprising, since it is not yet available and was publicized on April 17, 2013, the same day as our post. In contrast, Ditto's competing product was launched back in April last year.

Since the mid-1990s, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has issued countless bad software patents. These patents tend to be hopelessly vague and overbroad. Indeed, they are often so packed with indecipherable patent jargon that software engineers have trouble understanding them. As one programmer told This American Life, even his own patents look like pure “mumbo jumbo.” When they fall into the hands of patent trolls, these vague software patents become a tax on innovation.

If there's something that drives us crazy, it's when patents get in the way of innovation. Unfortunately, we often don't find out about the most dangerous patents until it's too late—once they've been used to assert infringement. That's why we were encouraged by the new provision of the patent law that allows third parties to easily challenge patent applications while those applications are still pending.

But, here's the rub: it's hard to identify those dangerous applications. And, once you do, it's even harder to find the right information to challenge those applications during the window that the law allows. So we partnered with the Cyberlaw Clinic at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society and Ask Patents and—most importantly—you.

EFF filed comments today urging the Federal Trade Commission to take action against patent trolls. We have written often about the rise of the patent troll—entities that don't create products themselves, but instead buy patents and make money from lawsuits—and the serious harm they are causing true innovators.